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Getting There Is No Part Of The Fun At All
Dec. 1st, 2002 03:09 pmYesterday was a chance to de-stress: B, C & R's annual mutual birthday party down in London, lots of fannish friends and quality food (and drink). Only ninety minutes down the A14/M11, so we set off at five to be there for 6.30 or so.
At 5.40 we came to a grinding half about 3 miles north of Stansted. And stayed there. We didn't get past Stansted until 8.30, with perhaps 90 minutes completely stationary. We infer that someone must have had an accident or broken down in the worst possible place, the single-lane traffic section in the roadworks at the Stansted junction. Whatever it was, it close the M11 for two hours and led to a 15-mile queue.
Particular peeves:
- Idiot drivers who think that being stuck in a jam for more than 20 minutes gives them the right to start driving along the hard shoulder with your hazard lights going. Sure enough, this just led to a traffic jam in the hard shoulder, which given the number of police cars and breakdown trucks heading along it was not helpful.
- Lame half-wit radio presenters who crack jokes about the M11 traffic jam during traffic alerts instead of telling us what the f**k is going on.
Anyway, we eventually got to the party at 9.15 or so. It turned out that there was still plenty to eat and drink and that our friends were all there - well, except for the ones who turned up an hour later, having been even further behind us in the queue. But we eventually relaxed and Had A Good Time.
And it was still only the second worst trip I've had to this party. In 1995 I rear-ended someone at a traffic light in Woking and had to come up by train...
MC
At 5.40 we came to a grinding half about 3 miles north of Stansted. And stayed there. We didn't get past Stansted until 8.30, with perhaps 90 minutes completely stationary. We infer that someone must have had an accident or broken down in the worst possible place, the single-lane traffic section in the roadworks at the Stansted junction. Whatever it was, it close the M11 for two hours and led to a 15-mile queue.
Particular peeves:
- Idiot drivers who think that being stuck in a jam for more than 20 minutes gives them the right to start driving along the hard shoulder with your hazard lights going. Sure enough, this just led to a traffic jam in the hard shoulder, which given the number of police cars and breakdown trucks heading along it was not helpful.
- Lame half-wit radio presenters who crack jokes about the M11 traffic jam during traffic alerts instead of telling us what the f**k is going on.
Anyway, we eventually got to the party at 9.15 or so. It turned out that there was still plenty to eat and drink and that our friends were all there - well, except for the ones who turned up an hour later, having been even further behind us in the queue. But we eventually relaxed and Had A Good Time.
And it was still only the second worst trip I've had to this party. In 1995 I rear-ended someone at a traffic light in Woking and had to come up by train...
MC
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